


The Prince Has Left The Building

by syllebuttsome



Series: Gladnoct Week 2018 [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gladnoct Week, M/M, Mermaids, gladio has very long hair, i want breakfast food now, ignis is going to be angry, no beta we die like men, noct you cheap bastard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-25
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-07-17 08:26:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16091813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syllebuttsome/pseuds/syllebuttsome
Summary: Written for Gladnoct Week 2018.  This is day 1: mercreature AU.





	The Prince Has Left The Building

Sundown was, fortunately, late, and the little rickety diner was still open for the last customers of the day.

He'd been looking at the menu for all of five seconds before he heard and smelled coffee filling his mug. 

“What'll it be?”

Gladio looked up from the fried foods and into the mascara-smeared eyes of the tired, aproned waitress, smiling. Her eyelashes only fluttered briefly, and she snapped her gum almost nervously.

“Just coffee. I'm waiting for a friend.”

“Okay, sweetheart. Just holler if you decide you want anything.”

Apparently this diner was used to seeing people as huge as he was, with such long hair and extensive tattooing. Everyone else in here, all these sunshiners, were as plain as gravel, trying to hide amongst the booths in their flannel against the checkered upholstery. 

The person he was waiting for didn't take much longer to arrive. Gladio had timed the little bugger down to the minute in the seven days he'd been above water.

Noctis Lucis Caelum, Crown Prince of every deepwater denizen in the Caem Bight, was as punctual for greasy sunshiner food as he was late for nearly every government function beneath the nearby waves. And while he was perceptive in water, continued exposure to the air seemed to have dulled his senses and he casually sat his butt down on another barstool without a word.

Easy there, Gladio told himself, heart constricting at the sight of the dark-haired man. Not like you'd had any real conversations about feelings before he ran. Don't get sappy just cuz you're out of your element.

He blinked. No pun intended.

In that little flutter of a moment, Noctis had gone from reading the menu to staring openly at the big, burly man balancing with impossible grace on his completely unsuitable bar stool. The whites of his eyes were as pale as his face.

“Hey,” Gladio rumbled, sipping his coffee.

Amazing how loud things could be here among the sunshiners. The slap of Noct's menu onto the peeling countertop caused his ears to ring long after he followed the young man all the way to the beach and beyond an outcropping of rocks.

Good. He wasn't fleeing into the sunshiner city. Gladio still had a chance to convince him to come back. 

“I'm not going back.”

Noctis had crossed his arms, and it was adorable. The hoodie he'd found was far too big on him. Ditto the swimtrunks. Ditto the flip flops, but only just. 

Distracting, but not distracting enough.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah, Dad made it pretty clear that if I wasn't going to be up to the challenge I should just go.”

That's totally not what King Regis had said, but leave it up to Noct to misunderstand. Gladio got it, kind of. It's not like the king had much longer, and he'd raised his son to embrace his perfectionism and emotions in equal measure – a perfect storm, for it had driven the prince to flee the waters into strange lands where his name meant nothing...

… and where he felt he couldn't do much more damage.

Gladio got it. Kind of.

It still pissed him off.

“So, that's totally not what he said. But I kinda get where you're coming from. Still, coming all the way here and wasting your one chance to use your legs this year was a bit much.”

Noctis scoffed. “We both know Ignis is better at this whole ruler crap than I am. I'm just leaving the throne in his capable hands.”

“Aaaaaand we both know that he doesn't want to be king, so that's out,” Gladio countered with a calm he didn't feel.

The prince scoffed again, kicking at the sand and losing a flipflop in the process. Momentarily satisfied, he sat in the sand and folded his legs into his chest, hiding his face.

Shit. 

Gladio looked out at the horizon. The sun was just beginning to skim the edge of the water, throwing up a riot of colours into the scudded clouds dotting the sky.

He didn't have much more time to do his convincing. His strengths lay in the written word and bodily action, not in diplomacy and persuasive essays. 

Time for plan B.

Noctis eyed him warily from the sand as he stripped himself of clothing. “Uh, Gladio...?”

“You know this the last day of the year I can come back for you, right? Did you plan for an entire year among the humans?” He looked over at the prince, forcing the younger's eyes down to the sand in embarrassment. Modesty. Hah. Of all the things Noctis could have picked up during his little siesta. 

“I doubt you did. So, you're gonna have to choose.” He snorted at the immediate glare. “It's not like you can't come back next year, but if you don't come back now, we're going to have problems.”

“I left so they didn't become my problems.”

“That much is obvious. But I think you know that that's a stupid excuse, and you're stalling, and you have about thirty more minutes to keep looking everywhere but at me, which is even more stupid.”

The prince had curled in on himself a little, burying his face in his shorts. “You're stupid.”

“What's stupid is that you think I believe you ran because you're just an impudent little shit. While that's true-” he grinned at the answering snort “-I know it's because you don't think you can do it. Ruling. Being king. But you know what?”

“What?”

“I know for a fact that living here on land isn't gonna be any easier. And I know you want to go home.”

I know you want to come home to me. He didn't say it, but he saw Noct's fingers reach unconsciously for the necklace he knew was hiding underneath the kid's too-baggy hoodie. A dark wooden necklace, from which dangled an X of teak, between little carved skulls of oak.

Fully naked now, and with his clothing folded upon the rocks, he crouched down next to the prince and nudged him softly.

“We can always come back next year. You, and me.”

Noctis peered out from under his bangs. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“...”

Gladio held out his hand. “Come home. With me.”

“I'm going to fuck it all up.”

“Well, you're probably gonna fuck up, but that's what you've got Ignis for.” And me.

The prince was quiet for a moment, then stood. Another moment passed, and he kicked off his other flipflop and started peeling off his ill-fitting outfit.

“I was tired of putting things on my tab, anyway.”

Gladio blinked. “You were what?”

Noctis was naked now, grinning. “I'll reconcile it when we come back next year.”

“They won't even let you back in once they recognize you, you little shit!”

But they were running to the waves, crashing into them, pumping at the water with their odd and cumbersome legs, until suddenly they weren't, and Gladio could see the prince's iridescent blue scales glinting below him in the water. 

Saltwater flooded his gills. He let his last breath of sunshiner air escape from his nose in a laugh and dove after his prince, reaching for his hand. When Noctis had slowed long enough to let him wrap their fingers together, the prince didn't let go for the rest of that night.


End file.
